Echoes of the Well of Souls watw-1

by Jack L. Chalker

  Nathan Brazil was familiar with the design and the reasons behind it. He was impressed to see that some of the ships weren’t wood anymore but were metal-plated or, in a few cases, seemed to be made out of wholly artificial new plasticlike substances. Their odd nature, though, remained out of necessity; literally just a few meters outside the harbor entrance, visible by day but hidden in the night and city lights, was another hex boundary. Beyond it, where these ships had to sail, a different technology level was imposed. Flotish was a semitech hex; mere steam or sail power could be used but nothing electrical worked. Batteries would not hold charges, generators and alternators might truly give off energy, but it could not be controlled and dissipated just about as fast as it was made. Even powerful broadcast signals from a high-tech hex like Ambreza would fade quickly once they passed that boundary, no matter how strong the source. Running an internal combustion engine large enough to be useful would result in the most beautiful and rapid burning up of an engine anybody had ever seen.

  Beyond were a few hexes that restricted all technology except direct mechanical devices. There great steam boilers would virtually explode, making it impossible to power any device, ships included. To travel those distances one had to use the most ancient of methods, the wind in the sail.

  That also meant that each ship had to carry a highly trained crew expert in both steam and sail and willing to live for long periods aboard ship. Such crews were highly paid and highly prized, and they acted like it. Ship’s law was the only law they respected, and the companies tended to pay for or gloss over any excesses in port. They also tended to be from a great many races, and here, at this port, Terry began to get a sampling of just what other sorts of creatures this world contained.

  Two large scorpionlike creatures moved down a side street to her left, startling her. They looked huge, mean, and menacing. Elsewhere were several man-sized bipeds wearing clothes that looked like they were out of some Renaissance movie epic, but they more resembled Sylvester the Cat, with their expressive, almost comical feline faces and fur and large fluffy tails. And there was a creature that looked half woman and half vulture, with a pretty face and mean killer’s eyes that seemed to glow in the dark. Like the Ambreza, most embodied some aspects of creatures she knew or at least knew about, but the association with familiar Earth creatures was merely a way of cataloging them so that her mind could deal with what she was seeing. The reference points were far from exact, but they were the only way she could cope with the many alien beings she encountered.

  Some, however, were beyond easy mental cataloging. Creatures with mottled, leathery dark green skin that went along at a fast clip on what seemed to be hundreds of spindly legs and whose entire bodies seemed to open into rows of sharp, pointy teeth; wrinkled, slow-moving dark gray masses that could only be thought of as hippos without apparent bones; squidlike monstrosities whose tails seemed topped with giant sunflowers. There were so many, and they were so bizarre both individually and collectively that she could only look at one and then another and hope nobody noticed her staring.

  But this was no freak show or chamber of horrors; these were people, people of ancient races, races as established as her own, from their own hex-shaped countries. She had to always remember that.

  Brazil pulled up in front of a lighted office and dismounted, tying his horse loosely to what he knew was a fireplug. Terry wasn’t sure what to do. Her impulse was to remain outside, but she had no idea what this place was or how long Brazil might be. After a moment she got down and followed him into the office.

  Almost immediately she felt a sense of claustrophobia, of being hemmed in, of the walls and ceiling maybe closing in on her. She repressed it as best she could and managed to stay with him, but she didn’t like the feeling.

  The creature behind a counter was a large, irregular lump maybe only a bit taller than their own height that seemed to be an animated mass of tiny red and green feathers from behind which, much farther down than would be expected, two huge, round yellow eyes looked back at them.

  “Yes?” the creature asked Brazil pleasantly, barely giving Terry a glance.

  “Are there any ships in now outbound to Agon or Clopta or anywhere else semitech or above in the northwest?” Brazil asked it.

  “Nothing direct,” the creature replied. “The Setting Sun down at Pier 69 may be your best bet. It stops at Kalibu, Hakazit, Tuirith, and Krysmilar. You might be able to change, particularly at Hakazit, since there’s a lot of cross-channel stuff out of there.”

  “Nothing else coming in that might be more direct?”

  “Sorry. Not until sometime next month, and that won’t give you any time advantage. The only other possibility for Agon is something like the Northern Winds leaving in two days for Parmiter, but your chances of a westbound connection from there are slim to none, and you’d have to walk overland.”

  “Yeah, well, that would be a solution if Agon were my final destination, but it’s not. I’ll have enough overland without starting that early. When does Setting Sun sail?”

  “Let me see…” The huge eyes dropped down to look at something below the counter. “They’re still finishing offloading, and they have a lot to get on. They’re scheduled for high tide… the day after tomorrow. About nine in the morning local time.”

  “That sounds reasonable. I need to book passage on that sailing to Hakazit if it’s available, with a cabin if possible.”

  “Yes, sir. For two?”

  He turned and looked at Terry, who was showing her discomfort and staring around the office with a queasy look. Still, she was here.

  “Yes,” he sighed. “Might as well. What’s the weather supposed to be en route?”

  “Possible storms in west Ronbonz, otherwise choppy but not uncomfortable. The winds, however, are unpredictable in this crossing, particularly in storms.”

  “I’ll still take it. You have anything on the basics of Hakazit or a general hex guide? I want to see if it’s feasible to book the horses on as well.”

  “Animals are not guaranteed in shipment,” the strange clerk warned him. “There is a bookshop on Vremzy Street, two blocks in and one left. It’s closed by now, but it will be open all day tomorrow. You can get what you need there. Outfitters and suppliers are along that street as well. We can probably add two animals with no problem if you come back here by nine or ten tomorrow night with your prepaid ticket. In the meantime they can be quartered at the livestock area, Warehouse 29 just along this street. Now, I’ll need to know your native hex so that sufficient edible provisions can be laid on for you and the cabin prepared properly.”

  Nathan Brazil grinned. “Glathrielian.”

  Those huge eyes seemed to double in size. “You are joking, of course.”

  “No, I’m not. We came through the Well from offworld, and that’s what we are. It won’t be hard even if your guide doesn’t list us. I’ll give you a half dozen or more races we’re compatible with.”

  “Very well. So you’re what Glathrielians look like.”

  “You work here and you’ve never seen any?”

  “I’m actually the purser on the Honza Queen. When we’re in port, we take the late shifts in the company offices. There isn’t much here to interest me, anyway.”

  The fare was not cheap, but it was reasonable, and Brazil felt certain he could more than afford this leg. There would be other times when things would be a lot harder.

  Besides, it might be interesting to see how hard the ship’s crew and other passengers might gamble.

  Finally, Brazil asked, “Is there any outdoor area nearby where we might be able to camp? I suspect that any hotels in this area won’t be set up for us, and I have my own food.” There usually were such places around ports, particularly because most of them naturally provided only for the races that were the most common visitors. The Gulf of Zinjin was an arm of the Well World’s greatest ocean, and there were far too many possible visitors to economically provide for them all, and particularly not Glath
rielians.

  “Far northern end, past the last pier,” the clerk informed him. “Rather nice, although a bit chilly some nights for hairless types. A number of small merchants have local stalls up there from dawn to dusk, too, if you can tolerate the local food.”

  “Some of it. Well, it sounds fine to me. Any permits required?”

  “Not at the port one. All others, you’d need to report to the police first.”

  The clerk made a series of entries with two huge, clawed hands that extended from under the feathers, and the computer spit out very neat-looking ticket books. Brazil thanked him, put the tickets away, and went back outside, with Terry following. Just walking back out in the air seemed to lift an enormous burden from her, but she still felt a little shaken and a little sick from the experience. Being enclosed was going to be very, very rough on her indeed, she knew. Brazil decided to take the horses with them rather than pay to have them quartered at the warehouse. The odds of their being in the way at the park were more than outweighed by the possibilities of selling them to the locals there if transporting them proved to be a problem, and it might. Hakazit and Agon were also high-tech hexes, and any layover in the former would just leave him with even more ravenous mouths to feed, not to mention the problem of horse droppings, which many places, and particularly high-tech places, tended to frown on.

  The park wasn’t much, just a large area that apparently had been part of a much earlier port and settlement, long abandoned. They’d planted some trees, as much to keep erosion down as for shelter, and it fronted right on the Gulf, with a small jetty leading out to guide lights warning off any incoming ships.

  If anyone else was using the park right now, he couldn’t see them, although with some clouds and only a few electric streetlights he might well have missed them. Still, there was a nice ocean smell coming in on the breeze and the quiet sound of waves lapping at the old pylons.

  He picked a spot just inside the trees and set up the small tent and the camping outfit as he had in Glathriel. Thanks to the brevity of his trip, he still had a five-day supply of food and gas canisters, and there was a very nice if somewhat elaborate fountain in the middle of the park that, thankfully, had fresh water.

  Terry used her new night sense to survey the area and found virtually nothing edible in and around the park. She knew she could wander farther afield, but this was a large and strange city and was unlikely to have any real groves close by. Here one didn’t pick one’s food, one bought it.

  Thus, when Brazil opened up his food supplies and gestured an offer to share, she had no choice but to accept, although she made it clear with hand signals that it was not to be cooked. Something of an amateur gourmet who fancied herself a very good cook, she now found the thought of cooked food thoroughly repulsive.

  Brazil did not compromise his own preferences for hers but did find a perverse fascination in watching her eat. Knowing that she must have been a civilized, modern woman, he was fascinated to see her take an open container of preserved fruit, for example, and just scoop it out with her fingers. He was even more surprised when she took and ate the beef he had, both ground and in small filets, also raw. He remembered then the Ambrezan foreman telling him that Glathrielians would eat meat, but only if it was already dead.

  Terry, too, was surprised both at her appetite and at the fact that the meat tasted exceptionally good right out of the container. Until now she’d always liked her meat cooked through, and with sauces and all the trimmings if available. While he packed up and saw to the horses, she went to the fountain and then to relieve herself, and when she got back, he was getting ready to turn in. It had been a long, tiring day, and both keenly felt it.

  A very chilly sea breeze was developing, and he was concerned for her. He offered her a spot in his tent, limited as it was, or his sleeping bag, but she declined both with a smile. Then she gave him a little hug and a kiss and went off.

  Again he’d noticed that odd, almost static electricity feeling when they’d touched, but now he noticed another thing as well.

  She’d been warm to the touch, with no sign at all of the chill he felt on his face and hands. As warm as summertime.

  Terry didn’t notice this because she really didn’t feel it. The field around her that she could see, generated somehow by her own body, acted as insulator and even life support system in some odd way. She felt warm and comfortable, and she picked a tree almost over Brazil’s tent and scampered up it, then found a comfortable notch and settled in for the night.

  Terry awoke the next morning feeling nauseous, and for a moment she was afraid it was the food. Something inside her, though, told her that it wasn’t, that it would pass, and she trusted her instincts as usual and they proved correct. She still felt a little queasy when Brazil finally got up and found her there waiting for him, but she didn’t let on that anything was wrong, and after getting something to eat, the feeling gradually vanished.

  Brazil bought breakfast from the promised local merchants, who set up small booths along the waterfront area of the park selling homegrown produce and other things. He discovered that Terry would eat bread, the first cooked item he had seen her accept, but not eggs. In point of fact, she ate two whole home-baked loaves of bread and two large melons, and Brazil began to wonder if he could literally afford to take her with that kind of appetite.

  He walked back into the port district; he’d already made a decision that the horses would be far too much of a burden until they were needed to be worth the cost and had opened some discussions with a stall merchant who kept a couple of horses at his place outside the city. Terry followed him through the now-bustling area, and her head began to reel with the number of races and weird sounds and smells that made the whole place come alive. She had already figured, though, that he was leaving by ship, and she no longer felt compelled to enter the buildings he entered.

  So many sounds, so many races… how did they understand each other? She found the whole thing bewildering. The Glathrielians whose lives she’d shared had not prepared her for this.

  Occasionally one or another of the creatures would say something to her, but she was always able to convey by some gesture or expression that she did not understand them. Still, she did feel the irony of being naked and exposed in a strange city and yearned for a dark alleyway. Once a particularly smelly and repulsive-looking reptilian creature had actually touched her, and she’d reacted instantly with a nearly panicky mental push that said “Go away!” And the creature had frozen, looked puzzled for a moment, then seemed to lose all interest in her and actually had gone away!

  Could she really do that, or was it a coincidence? One of these times she’d find out.

  Brazil emerged from the bookshop with something of what he needed. He had been surprised to find, in the first few weeks after landing in Ambreza, that he was able to figure out the written language almost as if it were something he’d forgotten rather than something he’d never known. It was a little cumbersome and not all of it read just right, but what he needed to read he had little problem figuring out.

  The map was the most important thing. When he had the time, he intended to annotate it in Latin, the “stock” Earth language he’d found the most useful over the long haul, so he wouldn’t have to keep looking up and remembering this term or that and figuring out things word by word and sentence by sentence. There was a sort of common written language here, one used for interhex trade and commerce—the ticket was in it—but he found it less familiar and less useful than Ambrezan.

  Of course, he knew what had happened. He was remembering ancient Ambrezan, which had evolved greatly over the millennia since his last time here, and the common language he’d known had been entirely replaced, perhaps many times.

  He then stopped at the ministry of commerce offices to call in to the capital, report something on his slight observations on Glathrielians—mostly to omit any of the oddities and report a very primitive life-style of no threat or consequence to the Ambrezans—and
get what information he could on Mavra’s group.

  There was some information, but it was incomplete and not guaranteed. Of the two men and two women who came in, one was reported in Erdom, as he’d surmised, another was in Zebede, which did surprise him, a third was in Dahir, and a fourth, clearly Mavra, had shown up in Glathriel, as he already knew.

  “But who’s this other Glathrielian female I have with me?” he asked them. “If she didn’t come in with me, and she didn’t, since I know where mine are, and she didn’t come in with them, she must have come in either alone or with another group.”

  “The only group we have other than yours and the larger party is two males about three weeks after you arrived. One of those is a Leeming, and the other—that’s odd—also an Erdomite.”

  “Well, then, who is this girl?”

  “You’re sure she’s not a native putting you on?”

  He sighed. “Natives do not look like her. I know you might not be able to tell them apart, but I sure can. And natives don’t draw maps of televisions and cameras and North America on Earth.”

  “Well, we have no reports of anybody coming through except those we told you about. Sorry. They are quite upset with this at Zone Security, you know. There’s an investigation to find out just how this happened. Right now the only plausible theory is that she came in just after one of your groups, probably the larger one, and somehow snuck by security and went directly through the gate without being noticed. How that’s possible nobody can say.”

  Nathan Brazil sighed and muttered, “Television reporters,” in a disgusted tone. “All right, thank you. I’ll be off now, and it’s unlikely although not impossible that I’ll be back. I thank you for all your help.”