“You have good information. Yes, a Lata—like you, not one of the trusted friends of the Yaxa, nor the other way around; but we have decided to work together rather than battle each other. You should join with us. It will avoid needless violence and duplicated effort—and you will be two to one against me in case you still mistrust my motives.”
Renard did in fact totally mistrust the motives of the creature, but there was some sense in what she said. “All right, for now we’ll be a threesome. I am Renard.”
The Yaxa’s death’s head nodded slightly. “I know. I am called Wooley. The Lata I believe you know—Vistaru.”
It was still a surprise, even though he’d guessed it. Vistaru, too—after all this time.
“When will she join us?” he asked.
“She will meet us here as soon as she can,” Wooley replied. “In the meantime, we will share our information and try to narrow the search.”
There seemed little point in holding back. If he refused, the Yaxa would simply go to the gamekeeper and ask the same questions. He told.
Finally, Wooley asked, “If she is making for Gedemondas, then undoubtedly by now she is at the coast. How will she cross the Sea? She can not even talk.”
Renard considered that for a moment. “If there’s a way to do it, Mavra Chang will figure it out.”
Hygit, Chief Port of Wuckl
The smell was of dead fish mixed with strong salt spray. The narrow strip of beach had been pretty much covered by wharves and piers, most made of the pliant but tough local woods. Some had buildings of wood and aluminum on them. This was the port of Hygit, where the unique vegetables and fruits of the country were shipped elsewhere in exchange for raw materials.
Mavra and Joshi had lived for a few days beneath one of the more commercial piers—under a fish market, actually, where small boats brought their catches from the sea hex of Zanti to market around midday. Pickings were pretty good around the pier. First, there were always dead fish around as well as the debris of commerce left in an area seldom cleaned.
The sturdy pylons and struts that supported the structures provided a natural haven for the pigs. The sand, what there was of it, was a gray-black, the woods a weathered brown, affording them protective coloration. No one except a building inspector was ever likely to visit, either. Furthermore, this was a commercial location, not a likely spot for recreation or idle sightseeing.
It was also a good place to eavesdrop. Squatting beneath the small sidewalk bars frequented by seamen and Wuckl longshoremen, Mavra picked up the kinds of information she needed.
The date amazed her the most. It had only been a little over three weeks. The Toorine Trader was still four days from due, plenty of time. A sister ship was in. Mavra knew that crew, too, but they didn’t have the story or the bribe and might not be as useful to her needs. The ship did allow them to scout, though; Wuckl was an exceptionally honest place, and holds were left open, side ramps down, when workers took breaks.
The Changs could have just stowed away. It might be possible to do so, if they could be assured of some food and could find some way of knowing where they were at any given point. She considered a better way.
Late at night she sneaked into the warehouse, treading softly to keep the clatter of her hooves on the smooth floor from echoing through the building. The cargo was identified with standard tags, large cards that fitted in slotted clips on the containers. Since so many races were involved in interhex trade, each with its own written language, pictographic hex symbols were used to show destination. On top of each card a color code or pictogram was placed for special instructions.
Live cargo was sometimes carried; there were cages of various shapes and sizes about, and she and Joshi checked one out. It had a straight, double-bolt lock, no provision for something more formidable. Joshi locked her inside the cage, and she worked hard for several minutes standing against the door, working at the bolts with mouth and tongue. Opening the cage from inside was harder than it looked; other animals might figure out simple bolts as well, and this one was designed to guard against that.
Still at work, they heard a sound echo against the walls of the warehouse. The watchman was making its rounds, and Mavra was still inside. Briefly Joshi considered trying to free her, but he realized that the noise would bring more attention than it was worth, and he opted instead to hide behind some wooden vegetable crates. Mavra could do nothing but huddle in the rear of the cage, in shadow, and hold her breath.
The Wuckl walked by on its great clawed bird’s feet, pacing slowly, steadily, but relaxed. It shined a portable spotlight here and there at random. Clearly it was not expecting trouble, just checking on things.
Feeling helpless, she hunched up as much as she could and waited as the footsteps approached. The light swung from one side to the other, and as it seemed that the watchman was almost upon her it shined directly on her for a moment. Mavra felt panicky, exposed—trapped. But the light swung away; the Wuckl was swinging it to and fro idly, and hadn’t been looking.
Soon the Wuckl was gone, out the door and out of the warehouse. They breathed again, but Mavra was shaken by the encounter. Being caged and helplessly cornered was new to her; she hated it, and feared it.
Still, there was the problem. She went back to working on the lock. Finally, she grunted in their code, “It won’t work. Get me out and we’ll try something else.”
The bolts were easily slid with Joshi’s flat snout from the outside, and she almost leaped out in relief. After a few moments to get hold of herself, she examined the rest of the warehouse.
One major problem was that everything was so high and they were so low to the ground. Even in her old form she had been more than a meter high; now, with the shorter pig’s legs, her fat stomach almost rubbed the floor, and even a normal table appeared a giant obstacle.
She found the manager’s office, and started looking around on the floor. It was dark, and the light switch might as well have been a light-year high on the wall, but she’d lived by other senses for almost half her life and those senses were much sharper now.
Finally she caught the smell; like all smells, it seemed different than she remembered, but it was unmistakable. Crawling half under a file, she struggled with, then managed to roll out a big grease pencil.
There were lots of paper scraps about, and they managed to find some fairly large sheets. Then Joshi took them in his mouth while she held the pencil in hers. They left.
Over the next day, in their hideout beneath the pier, Mavra tried holding the pencil in her mouth while he held paper with his hooves. It was tough, and there were several false starts until she managed an intelligible message. It was shaky, uneven, a terrible scrawl, but finally she made one that was readable. Wandering in frail lines all over the paper, it said: i am mavra chang help me dont tell
She hoped it was good enough.
Now she had to wait; the ship then in port was heading in the wrong direction. For her only the Trader would do.
* * *
The streets of Hygit were crowded with Wuckl of all sizes scurrying to and fro. The clamor of trams, some motorized traffic, and all the rest of the sights and sounds indicated a big city in a high-tech hex. The foursome making their way down one of the streets drew a great deal of attention even in a city used to the strange life forms of passing ships.
Vistaru, perched on Domaru’s rump, grumbled, “You could hide an army in a place like this.” Her soft, tiny voice was almost drowned out by the sound.
Renard, leading the great horse through the crowd, nodded in agreement. “It does look rather hopeless, doesn’t it? But she’s here, I’ll bet on it. This is the only east coast port.”
“She will be down by the docks,” Wooley added. “It may not be as hopeless as you think. Consider how long and involved a journey it has been to this point, and now we have closed the gap. I feel that the search will end here. Come, let us go to the wharves.”
The city’s low hills dropped off abruptly at the coast; a cliff had been smoothed mechanically and they descended a steep, final incline to the piers, one of which, from the top, afforded a panorama of the port complex and the rough seas out to the horizon.
“Look!” Renard noted, pointing. “Smoke. A ship’s coming in!”
“Going out, more likely,” the Yaxa replied. “It draws a bit farther away. I should not like to be on it—that sky looks very threatening.”
It did indeed, but the dark clouds and occasional distant lightning contrasted with the warmth and sunshine they enjoyed. Another hex lay in that direction; Wuckl’s slightly pinkish atmosphere and somewhat darker water marked the border between Wuckl and the next hex.
Of course, such differences existed between each Southern hex, but they were usually minor—a matter of humidity, carbon-dioxide content, the addition or subtraction of some trace gas. In only a few was it necessary for visitors to use respirators or protective gear. Nonetheless, all hexes were slightly uncomfortable for nonresidents.
“It is disappearing,” Vistaru noted. “Look—you can’t see the smoke any more. They’re making speed.”
“Zanti is high-tech,” the Yaxa reminded them. “They will have full power and speed.”
Ordinarily two high-tech hexes did not adjoin, but there were exceptions. For their part, the Wuckl swam poorly and could not tolerate more than a dozen or so meters depth; the Zanti, nearly immobile plants few had seen, could not stand depths of less than one hundred fifty meters. In this case the two hexes were well balanced; neither had anything the other wanted, and in the few matters—like fishing rights—that required interhex cooperation, they got along well.
Renard had a funny feeling all of a sudden about that ship. “You know,” he said glumly, “wouldn’t it be a bitch if that’s the Toorine Trader, or something, and they’re on it?”
Theirs had been a long and tiring hunt; suddenly all three felt that he was right. Their pace accelerated.
At the docks they found tired longshoremen packing their gear. The Wuckl were fascinated by the strange-looking foursome, but pleasant enough.
“Excuse me—was that the Toorine Trader just left?” Renard asked with grim foreboding.
The Wuckl gave that shake of assent. “That’s right. You missed her by a good half-hour. Next boat in three days.”
There was not a shred of doubt in the three aliens’ minds that Mavra Chang was somehow aboard her.
“We can fly out and overtake her,” Vistaru suggested.
“Wouldn’t recommend it,” the Wuckl longshoreman put in. “That’s a hell of a storm brewin’ out there. If Zanti weren’t a high-tech hex, they’d never have put to sea at all, I think. They’re built to take it. But there are winds over eighty kilometers per hour in it, and a good deal of sleet. That’s cold water—dip your feet in it if you want to see how cold. It’s why we’re fogged in here almost every night.”
“How long before the storm passes?” Wooley asked the Wuckl.
The longshoreman wagged its neck a bit. “Hard to say. Meteorology up at the Port Authority Building could probably tell you. Not before midmorning tomorrow, though, I’d say.”
The Yaxa thought a moment. “Any idea how fast the ship moves in a high-tech hex?”
The Wuckl cocked its head and considered it. “In a calm with full power, maybe twenty-five, thirty kilometers per hour, more or less. They got the storm with them, though, so make it thirty, I’d say.”
Renard looked at the other two. “If the storm lasts as long as our friend here estimates, that’s about fourteen hours. Four hundred twenty kilometers head start.” He turned back to the Wuckl. “This is near the hex border, isn’t it? I mean, Zanti and the next water hex.”
The longshoreman nodded. “Yep. But they won’t go over into Simjim if they can help it. It’s nontech. They’re headin’ for Mucrol, and they’ll keep to the high-tech side unless the storm’s too bad to deal with. A straight line’s always best, you know.”
They thanked the Wuckl and Renard quickly got the map from Domaru’s saddle bags. They all peered at it intently.
“All right, here’s where they’d have to land in Mucrol,” Renard pointed. “Now, there’s Gedemondas, possibly two hex sides overland. If we assume she’s a stowaway, then she’ll have to get off at the Mucrol port. So that’s where we head to begin with. If, on the other hand, she’s managed to communicate with the crew, and if they’re willing, I’d bet on them dropping her as far north in Mucrol as possible, giving her only a hex side to cross, here, near Alestol. If there’s nothing at the Mucrol port, that’s where we head next.”
Vistaru stared at the map in concern. “I don’t know about this Mucrol—but I hope she doesn’t cross into Alestol. Those nasty barrel-shaped plants can gas you in seconds.”
“The Yaxa are friendly with Alestol,” Wooley pointed out. “If we can get to a Zone Gate somewhere I can send a message to watch for them but not to harm them.”
“Not much chance of that,” Renard responded. “We’ll be sticking to the borders, and the water hexes are out for that. No, we’ll stick to Mucrol. She’ll be aware of the dangers on the other side.”
Vistaru was thoughtful. “I wonder, though, about the dangers on the Mucrol side.”
Renard’s head shot up, looked straight at her. “You know about the place?” he asked sharply.
She shook her head. “Not a thing. Do you? Or you, Wooley?”
None of them did. It was a complete mystery.
Mucrol
Ti-gan stared into the midday sun from his post atop the caravan. It was bleak country; a desert of reds and oranges and purples, badly eroded and with occasional clumps of brush, cactus, even a few trees where ground water approached nearer the surface. It was like this for much of the year, except in early and mid spring when melting snows from the northeastern mountains sent floodwater—in its own way, as dangerous as any enemy—cascading through the canyons.
There was water, though; it was locked beneath the surface, and brought up by steam pumps into basins, which then had to be jealously guarded. To control a pack’s water was to control it completely.
Ti-gan looked like a cross between a dog and a weasel; his face came almost to a point at a moist black nose, under which a huge mouth opened to reveal a nasty set of long, sharp teeth. He had rounded, saucerlike ears. His body was disproportionately small for a creature with a head the size of Ti-gan’s. His arms and legs ended in stubby black five-fingered paws with equally dark claws, somewhat like those of a raccoon. When he moved he moved on all fours, but when seated, as he now was, he sat back on thick rear legs, resting on his tailless rump like a humanoid.
To the first-time viewer, a Pack Guard Unit was a strange sight—a massive armored platform supported on rows of giant balloon tires, each with an independent axle so that it followed the subtle contours of the harsh land like a treaded vehicle. On top was a wall of metal with gun ports, and a smaller structure atop that was also well armored. Five progressively smaller decks terminated in a huge sooty smokestack that belched great plumes of steam and ash to be sucked up by the dry air.
It was the driest of seasons, and therefore the most dangerous. Some packs had only mudholes now, with the prospect of four weeks or more until the melt started. So it was a time of desperation. Particularly during this period, all were loaded into Pack Guard Units except those in the water village that were needed for essential services. Expecting a last-ditch attack at any moment, they patrolled in a circle around the oasis that was the key to their power.
It was hot as hell in the Pack Guard Unit, although some relief from massive fans was possible. Ti-gan’s pack had once managed to trade for some precious freon produced across the waters-that-cannot-be-drunk, so steam-powered air conditioning cooled the upper tiers. The effect was almost self-defeating, though; so many bodies gathered in the cooler areas that their natural body heat was overcoming the advantages.
Ti-gan preferred the outside, the steady wind and occasional cool breeze from the far-off mountains. None of the Mucrolians, as much as they felt the heat and discomfort, considered the conditions intolerable. They had been born in this environment and perceived it as one of life’s normal burdens. Flies buzzed around him, and he idly swatted at them, not really caring what they did nor even blaming them. It was a hard country, and all life had an equal right to struggle.
He leaned over, blew into a speaking tube, and was rewarded when a little mechanical gauge near him twitched and rang a bell, informing him that someone was still able to move in the engine room.
“Cut to idle, all stop,” Ti-gan commanded, and the PGU ground to a halt. There was still vibration and some engine noise, of course, but not nearly the roar there had been. He didn’t know why he’d ordered the halt; just a sense developed in him after long years of experience. Something not quite right, something he had to check out. He reached over and picked up his field glasses.
Although his race was almost color-blind, seeing everything in a nearly completely faded set of textures often allowed better visual discrimination than did true color sense. His eyes were extremely sharp and the field glasses made them almost phenomenal. He surveyed the hills to his right, looking for he knew not what.
He was almost ready to admit to himself that he was simply jumpy or getting too old when he noticed movement—very slight, almost lost among the shades of almost-gray among the low hills to his right.
Two figures, going fairly slowly. He adjusted the focus to try to see what they were, but they were just too far off. Nothing familiar, that was for sure. Not scouts from an attacking PGU, but not desert animals, either.
“Left nine degrees and full speed,” he called into the speaking tube. The PGU roared to life, hissing and moaning, and by the application of power to only one side at first, it waddled off. “Full speed” wasn’t all that fast, but it would do.
At first the two figures seemed unsure when they heard the sounds, then they tried to hide in a small wash. Ti-gan nodded to himself in satisfaction; they were making pursuit too easy.
“Give me a five-man squad, pistols, and nets.”
There was a lot of sound and movement inside the PGU, and within a minute the squad was on the third tier, ready. He nodded to them and gestured in the direction of the two strange objects.
“Two of them, some kind of animal, not anything I know,” he shouted to the squad leader. “Try and take them alive if you can. I want to see just what the devil we’ve got there.”
They strained but could see nothing. Finally Ti-gan shouted, “Get up on the jump platform. I’ll give ’em a panic flare that’ll start ’em running!”
They climbed to the second tier to a flat area of metal flush with the armored sides. They waited, more excited than tense. They rather welcomed this little break in the tedium of the slow roast below.