It was amazing how quiet, almost dead, the place felt and
sounded. But for the wind in the trees and an occasional
sound of some insect or tree-dwelling animal flitting about,
disturbed by their passage, there didn't seem to be anyone
home at all. When they reached a shallow creek, the horses
stopped to drink and didn't fall over, so they decided to
make camp there. They set a rotating watch, of course, but if
anyone was out looking for them, they missed by a country
mile.
It was the quiet that got to them, both in the night and
through the first few hours of the next day. This was not the
kind of region where no one would want to live or work; the
climate was at least subtropical, the vegetation lush but appar-
ently not dangerous, and there seemed to be no predators
lurking about anywhere. Still, there were no signs of paths or
trails or large animal droppings anywhere about; nothing to
indicate that this was a place that had ever seen any sort of
man.
Dorion tried to use the daylight to good advantage, hauling
out and paging through his Pocket Grimoire for any stock
spells he was capable of throwing that might help them out.
The invisibility spell held promise, but it was very limited
and, being a basic public domain-type spell, was so easily
countered that it would probably just trap them. It was strictly
a one-person deal anyway, and transitory.
WAR OF THE MAELSTROM 135
Let's see. . . . Love spells and charms, aphrodisiacs. . . .
No, even if they might be useful, he couldn't see being
fawned over by a love-starved Klutiian or something. The
curses, too, seemed both too specific and too complex to be
useful in a live or die situation, although they were fully half
the book. Well . . . maybe. Here was blindness, deafness,
striking someone dumb, that sort of thing. Fine if he had
something organic of the subject's or was face to face with
him, but otherwise next to impossible.
The hypnotic spells were a better choice, although they
were simple and few and easily broken or stalled by someone
with great will power. Those sentries back there, however,
might have been easy marks—if he had the nerve to pop up
near such ones and invoke the spell first. He didn't know
what was best. if anything, but he was determined to keep
looking.
They found the road without much trouble and followed it
along the side, always keeping nearby cover in mind, and
cautiously scouting every bend and every hill before ventur-
ing forth.
There was, however, no apparent traffic and no threats
from either direction. At Halagar's insistence they kept playing
it supercautious, which slowed their progress to a crawl, but
they soon began to feel alone in a strangely desolate world.
Four days in, they came to a town center. Clearly estab-
lished as a main support link on the road, it looked to have
supported perhaps a thousand people in various forms of
activity, but now the nearby fields stood untended and the
streets seemed as deserted as the forest.
Halagar waited until nightfall and then went in on his own,
looking over the whole of the town and taking his own sweet
time about it as the others waited. He finally returned, shak-
ing his head in confusion.
"No one! Nothing!" he reported. "It is strange. Almost as
if everyone along here was ordered evacuated. Everything's
been put away or carted away that was of any use or value,
and the thing has been just abandoned. From the looks of the
dung, feed barns, and the like, I'd say it's been this way for
perhaps two weeks. There are some ugly signs, though. The
government house had suffered a major fire—it's in ruins. A
number of the Akhbreed houses and shops had been clearly
136 ]ack L. Chalker
ransacked—not closed in an orderly manner like the rest—
and there were old, dried bloodstains in great numbers. I
think it's safe to go in there now, though, and even sleep in
those unused beds and perhaps work up something hot out of
what we've got. There's nobody left now. Besides, I'd like to
examine the town closer in daylight."
They'd brought along mostly practical food, so there wasn't
much chance of a real cooked meal, but it was nice to be able
to brew coffee and tea at least. The real beds were comfort-
able, too, but both Dorion and Boday felt as if they were
somehow going to sleep in a gigantic grave; as if the place
were somehow haunted, tinged with evil.
The next day, Halagar discovered that their feelings were
somewhat justified, although nothing supernatural needed to
be involved. He brought them around to a place near the old
government house and pointed. "Buildings weren't the only
things they burned." he noted.
Someone had dug large pits behind the government house
and filled them, then poured something flammable on the
piles, and lit them. But bones didn't burn all that cleanly or
well.
Halagar sifted through the charred and blackened remains
with a stick and uncovered some blackened skulls. "This one
had his head crushed in," he noted clinically, "but some of
the others appear unmarked. That doesn't mean much, but
there are a tot of remains here and they look almost all
Akhbreed in both pits."
"What must have happened here?" Boday asked, appalled.
"Not an invasion, certainly," the mercenary replied. "They
would have just sacked the town and left the remains to rot.
This was orderly, organized. Only Akhbreed places were
burned or ransacked; only Akhbreed were thrown into the pit.
Whatever the natives look like here, they're certainly smaller
and different than Akhbreed, and there's none of their re-
mains here. 1 would wager that if we looked hard we'd find
true graves for them. 1 think the inhabitants of this town—the
native inhabitants—awoke one day, or perhaps performed by
a signal what they had rehearsed for a long time, and system-
atically slew every Akhbreed in the town without regard to
who or what. Then their places were ransacked, their bodies
dumped here and disposed of, and they then very calmly
WAR OF THE MAELSTROM 137
packed up all that they wanted or needed and every man,
woman, and child went off."
"They would not dare do that!" Boday protested. "They
would know that they would be hunted down to the last
survivor and tortured to death, and the whole province would
be under military occupation."
Halagar nodded. "That's the drill, yes, and it's worked for
thousands of years. The Akhbreed colonials here surely thought
that way. which was why it was so easy. But, who is going to
look at this and vow revenge and hunt them down, Boday?
By whose authority? By whose power?"
"Why, the Tishbaal, of course!"
He shook his head sadly. "I doubt it. They're probably
withdrawn to the hub boundaries and fortified just like
Covanti's. They're not coming in here now, not when they
can't be reinforced from the hub. I think you're still thinking
too provincialty as well. Don't just look at this pit and this
town—think about all the towns and colonial outposts and
farms and factories and whatever on this world. All of them.
The odds are there are a half billion or more natives on this
world and maybe two, three million Akhbreed tops, spread
out all over the place, all secure that their sorcerers and
soldiers will protect them—taking it for granted. I should say
that there were two or three million Akhbreed. Ten to one the
survivors number in the thousands or less. They sealed the
world off and then they rose up and claimed it for their own. I
wonder how many worlds like this one there are where this
has happened, and nobody knows? And not just Tishbaal,
either.''
"But—they must be mad!" she maintained. "Perhaps things
are bottled up now, but they can not crack the hubs, and
sooner or later the Akhbreed sorcerers will come with or
without the troops and make this entire race wish it had never
been born!"
Dorion, also a product of Akhbreed culture, was as stunned
by this as Boday was, but he understood what Halagar was
thinking. "You're right," he agreed. "They wouldn't dare
mis knowing what must eventually come—if the hubs are in
fact impregnable. Clearly the natives here think they're not. 1
wonder what convinced them? This isn't something you do on
faith alone."
138 fack L. Chalker
"Perhaps we'll find out—further along the road," the mer-
cenary responded, and they packed up and prepared to ride.
It was close to sundown when they reached it, just over a
hill. Sitting on their horses atop the crest of the hill, they
looked across a vast valley that was unlike anything they had
ever seen.
The ground was yellow and purple, and strewn with tall,
spindly plants growing from it up into the heavens with
tendrils waving about—and not from any wind. The great,
green weeds with thorny plates like bones thrashed like some
alien squid half-hidden in burrows in the ground. Although
planted, some were so close together that tentacles would
occasionally touch and there would be a furious battle, ending
only when the contacted tentacles of one were pulled out of
their trunks by the other. The remains of dead ones littered
the landscape as well, where two of the things had been too
close for both to tolerate survival.
"Changewind," Dorion breathed.
Halagar nodded. "And note its symmetry. The storm touched
down up there—you can actually see the start of it—then
progressed in an unnaturally straight course along the center
of the valley, stopping Just at the edge of the fields up there.
I've seen a thousand Changewind regions, and never one as
regular as this. Here's the answer to our puzzle—and an
unnerving one at that. A demonstration of blessing from the
gods. Can't you see the effect this would have if it were
announced in advance, through the high priests or whatever
of the natives here? On such-and-such a date and such-and-
such a time we will produce a Changewind just in this valley
as a sign of our godlike powers. Word would get around
fast—and if the Akhbreed were curious as well, or heard the
rumors, or wondered where some of the natives were going
and followed, what difference would it make? This would be
a sign from the gods writ too large to miss. The uprising must
have followed almost immediately. That's why there are still
plants out there fighting for their space. There hasn't been
enough time to gain balance as yet."
"Could Klittichom actually have done this?" Dorion won-
dered aloud. "By the gods! If he can do that on cue and to
such precision then what chance has anybody got?"
Halagar shrugged. "Who knows how they do it? I suspect
WAR OF THE MAELSTROM 339
it's not as bad as all that, that they need the precise coordi-
nates and limits at the very least. Otherwise they would have
to be physically present—both a top sorcerer like Klittichom
and the almost irreplaceable Storm Princess—at each attempt.
Too much risk there to them, and too much attention drawn. I
doubt if this was done too many times—yet. It was practice at
an ideal place of their choosing and with careful preparation
that also was an effective demonstration of their power to the
locals and perhaps visiting dignitaries and potential allies as
well. But, think now how easy it would be to get the coordi-
nates to the central government district of a hub, for example.
They're fixed, unmoving amidst the constant world shifting
around them."
"Yes, but then why have they not just taken out the hubs
one by one?" Boday asked him. "There must be more to it
than that."
"Maybe. Maybe not. You start taking out the hubs one by
one, and you get two or three in a row all this precise, and
you can't keep it quiet or quiet the suspicions of the remain-
ing sorcerers. They'd get out of the hubs and fast, I'd think,
and then they'd go hunting for Klittichom as a group and that
would be the end of this scheme. No, to get them, or at least
most of them, you arc going to have to attack all over
Akahlar simultaneously, or as close to that as possible—before
they can know what's happened to the others. The power is
awesome here, but Klittichom's had to tread on eggs none the
less. He and his storm witch are still vulnerable and they'll
only get one shot at this. That's what this is about. They're
doing selective demonstrations to get sufficient rebel colonial
forces to move to the hubs, so there will be an invasion and
occupation force when the Changewinds hit. There will still
be a hell of a fight. But this is genius. An all or nothing
gamble for all Akahlar!"
"You sound like you admire the guy," Boday noted sourly.
"A professional soldier's admiration for a great strategic
general, that's all," the mercenary assured her. "I'm just
beginning to wonder how we can ever hope to get through the
forces inevitably massed around Tishbaal hub."
Dorion looked back at the hostile, ugly valley with its
monstrous plants. "Even more immediate, I'm beginning to
wonder how the hell we get across this valley."
140 Jack L. Chalker
"We don't. Not with what we've got. But you can see
where it begins and ends. I'd say we make an early camp here
now and get some rest. Tomorrow we'll have to blaze our
own trail around. It shouldn't be too hard—the people and
animals of that village would have had to do the same. At
least we know now why they have such a flimsy force at their
rear and why the town would want to put themselves between
the hub border and this valley rather than exposed behind it.
At least I doubt if we'll have to worry tonight about guarding
front and rear."
Boday looked back at the scarred valley and then at the
peaceful and empty road. "Boday feels as if she is a horse-
shoe," she muttered, "with the smith's hammer behind and
the anvil ahead."
• 6 •
The Armies of the Winds
CHARLEY AWOKE SUDDENLY from a sound sleep and sat up,
puzzled. It was still quite dark, and she was very tired, yet
something had forced her awake even as the others, including
the light-sleeping Halagar, slumbered on.
That was odd, too, she thought suddenly. There is Halagar
right there and yet I'm me, I'm all here.
"Many men coining. You must wake and warn others,"