Twilight at the Well of Souls

At the Bahabi-Ambreza Border

“The men are gettng pretty pissed off, sir,” the Hakazit general told him sourly. “I mean, it’s not what they signed on for. Hell, I don’t believe it myself! Close to nine hundred kilometers and we haven’t killed anybody yet!”

Marquoz shrugged. “What can I do? That whole Durbis army was set up to take us—force-ray projectors, helicopter gunships, and all—and when we marched over that hill, everybody decided they’d visit the seashore for their health. I’ll admit it’s been a damn sight easier than I expected—so far. You just tell ’em that going up the Isthmus isn’t going to be any picnic.”

“It better hadn’t be,” the general huffed. “Otherwise, they’ll do us both in and go on a rampage on general principles.”

Marquoz chuckled and turned back to the border. Children, he thought. Like little children always dreaming and playing at war. The glories of battle and all that. Inwardly, he was thankful that a force of fifteen thousand Hakazit troops marching in precision across a wide swath of countryside had scared the hell out of the locals. He would need this force later, he knew, and he wasn’t all that certain that, when their buddies were getting smashed into goo all around them, the romance might not be over.

He was, he decided, developing a whole religious faith around the absolutism of genetics, and he hoped it wasn’t a false deity.

Ambreza, he believed, would be another easy mark. They wanted him in Glathriel and would do almost anything to let him get there. Getting out would be the problem.

As with many other races and most of the hexes here, a white flag or cloth meant not to shoot. It was a logical choice. Quite simply, it was easier to see at a distance. He wondered uncomfortably at times, though, about what would happen if he ever met an army whose national flag was white.

Affixing the flag to a staff, he rumbled down the side of a hill to the party below who waited under a similar banner. It was getting to be very routine by now.

The Ambreza were enormous rodents that somewhat resembled overgrown beavers, complete to the buckteeth and large, paddlelike tail. They walked upright, though, on large hind legs, using their tails as added balance, and their look of extreme innocence was deceptive. Once this hex had been Glathriel, not Ambreza. A high-tech hex whose “humans” had built a massive and powerful civilization, one that, simply from its own laziness and indolence, outgrew its living space and decided that the lush farmlands of the Ambreza next door were necessary to its continued comforts. Rather than fight a losing battle, the Ambreza had cast about and, as usual when certain impossibilities were needed, found it in the North, among races so strange and alien that you could get them to whip things up for you if you had the right trade goods and they would never even consider that they were making up a weapon, in this case a brutal gas that was harmless to all except Type 41 humans.

In the final preparations, the humans had begun massing on the Ambreza border when, throughout the hex, the canisters of gas were loosed. The Ambreza may have been nontech, but they weren’t ignorant. Their own “peace” party in negotiations in Glathriel had triggered the gas releases electronically.

It was colorless, odorless, and quite effective. In some way even the Ambreza didn’t understand it worked on the cerebral cortex of the human brain, and, rather slowly, the humans had simply become increasingly less able to think, to reason. The great apes had been the model for the Type 41s, and, mentally at least, great apes they became. The gas didn’t dissipate, either; it stayed, and settled into the rocks, the soil, everything, affecting new generations. Most died; the rest became pets of the Ambreza in their expansion into Glathriel.

Brazil had changed all that the last time he was through. Inside the Well he had altered not the gas but, subtly, the Type 41 brains that were affected by it. During Mavra Chang’s exile in Glathriel they had been savages, yes, but thinking savages. Marquoz wondered what they were now.

There were five Ambreza, each wearing some sort of medallion that the Hakazit took to be a badge of office or rank. With them were several others, one of whom looked decidedly strange, Marquoz thought uneasily, a huge, looming shape of pure white with only two small black ovals.

He stopped a few meters from the party and stuck his white flag in the dirt. “I am Marquoz of Hakazit,” he told them in his most menacing tone.

“I am Thoth, Chamberlain of the Region,” one of the Ambreza responded. “My fellow Ambreza are from the central authorities. The others are representatives of the council force invited here, with this,” he pointed to the white specter, “their commander, Gunit Sangh of Dahbi.”

Marquoz was impressed. He’d heard of Gunit Sangh, although the Dahbi were half a world away. He seemed to recall that Sangh had once tried the same trick the Ambreza had pulled on Glathriel but had been screwed in the attempt.

“I’ll get to the point,” he said, not acknowledging the others. “We have no wish to harm any citizens or territories, yours included. We only wish to march through the areas under your jurisdiction, Ambreza and Glathriel, as quickly as possible on the way north.”

“You are welcome here, friends,” Thoth responded, “but Glathriel is a very fragile place. We should not wish large forces to go there. It could upset the ecological balance.”

“We must go there to go north, as you well know,” the Hakazit parried. “Ginzin is only passable along the northeast coast. Glathriel is necessary. We will do minimal damage.”

“Glathriel is not open,” the Ambreza maintained.

Marquoz felt his stomach tense slightly. He turned and pointed back up the hill. “As you know, up there is the start of fifteen thousand creatures just like me. Most conventional weapons simply will not harm us. I realize that you have some very sophisticated weaponry that would, particularly the rays, but be aware that we, too, are from a high-tech hex and have our own. We also have seven hundred additional allied troops of various forms, many aerial and a number poisonous. My race is bred as a warrior race. We are not concerned with casualties or arguments. If you refuse us, we will march anyway, using all weaponry within our command to facilitate our course. Should we be opposed we will destroy utterly and without mercy any and all, soldiers and civilians, plants and animals, that are in our path.”

“You say ‘we,’ ” Gunit Sangh put in, his voice through the translator sounding still nasty and threatening. “You are not of our world. Those are not your people. I tend to think that, if we overlooked the diplomatic courtesies and simply eliminated you right here and now, that army would have no fight left.”

Inwardly, that idea did nothing for his stomach, but he kept his impassive stance and tone. “You’re wrong. I have just come from arguing with my generals because the men are upset. They have marched here without killing anyone or anything and that makes them unhappy. They want to fight. Should anything happen to me at this moment, you would lose the only moderating force around. You all would die immediately, of course—and after that Ambreza would be just a memory. Right now two Jorgasnovarians are over principal population centers in Ambreza carrying bombs made from designs I furnished. These are ancient weapons from my old sector of space, fairly easy to make once I discovered that there was uranium in Hakazit. Each bomb is atomic. Each will destroy an entire city and poison the countryside for generations with radioactivity. We can effectively deal with any remaining forces you have here. Make up your mind now. Yes or no. I intend to give the order to march immediately. How they do it is determined by your answer now.”

The Ambreza looked shocked. One turned to another and whispered, “Is such a weapon possible?” The other nodded.

Thoth, hearing this, shivered a bit and turned back to Marquoz. “We must have some time to discuss this!” he argued. “Please, a few minutes, at least!”

“You have no time. Yes or no? I want your answer now,” he pressed cooly. He actually found himself feeling a bit sorry for the Ambreza; they were so damned politically naive. That was the hole card for this entire business, he knew. A world with a lot of political and military intrigue in its past would never be taken in so quickly.

“He is bluffing,” Gunit Sangh snapped. “We have a solid force here. Let us join with them at this point and make an end to this matter.”

Of course, Marquoz conceded to himself, there were exceptions.

The Ambreza, however, were done in. After a quick, whispered conference there were nods and Thoth turned to the strange white creature. “Commander, it is our hex, you know.” He turned to Marquoz. “You may enter for transit,” he said hoarsely, gulping a couple of times. “Your march will not be impeded.”

Now Gunit Sangh unfolded himself. He was an impressive, vicious-looking creature, with three pairs of sticky tentacles and a face that said here was a thing that ate only living flesh. The tentacles showed sharp reflective shields of cartilage that obviously could cut like knives. The whole creature, close to three meters long, was in its own way as much a killing machine as the Hakazit—and unlike the Hakazit it looked very much in practice, not bluffing at all.

“I can do nothing if the host country forbids it,” Sangh spat. “But your untried army will have to face mine yet, off-worlder. You mark my words. I am the enemy you will have to face one day soon.”

“Any time,” Marquoz responded as casually as he could manage. “And, in case you think I’m a pushover, well, Colonel Asam sends his regards.”

“Asam!” the Dahbi hissed. “Eating the two of you will be the most supreme pleasure of my very long life!” And, with that, to the amazement of both sides, Gunit Sangh seemed to change his color to a more milky white, becoming slightly glowing, less substantial. He folded himself back into his ghostly shape and, without another word, sank into the ground itself as if it were water.

Marquoz felt well satisfied even though the troops would be upset at still no battle. He had faced down the Ambreza and removed another potentially nasty threat, neutralized that big multiracial force, and snubbed the enemy commander all at one time. He was particularly happy to have met Colonel Asam by chance in Zone; otherwise, he would never have known about that story…

He turned, nodded to a subordinate, and green flares were lit and shot into the air. The army started to move. He and his aides stood there and let it march past, looking damned menacing and impressive. The Ambreza and allied forms got out of the way fast; most, he guessed, were heading to nearby communications tents to radio the news.

One of his Hakazit aides inched over to him as they tramped by, masking most other sounds.

“Sir?”

“Yes?”

“Those bombs—superbombs or whatever. Was that for real?”

He drew himself up to full attention. “General, I would no more bluff than I would tell a lie,” he huffed, and that closed the matter.

And, of course, it took some time before the aide realized that he had not had an answer at all.

The passage across Ambreza had been swift and easy. Roads were cleared for them; vehicles, in fact, were provided. They avoided the major cities—no use in giving any provocations, he decided—and the Ambreza and allied forces they met along the way mostly stared, gawked, and even snapped pictures occasionally. The cold, crisp weather had the Hakazit breathing steam, and that leant an even more sinister touch to everything. Marquoz liked it. It was good theater.

It was easy to see where Ambreza ended and Glathriel began. It was winter in Ambreza, and the trees were barren and the soil frosted. But there, shimmering slightly, was a lush, green world ahead of them. It was like walking through some sort of invisible curtain from late fall into deepest summer. Glathriel was a tropical hex, and, as they saw, it was one that didn’t stop just because an army was passing through.

They were all around, these creatures that looked so much like the dominant race of the Com from which he had come. And why not? These were the prototypes, smaller than the average Com human, but that might have been climate or diet or a combination of things, and darker, too, but very much “human” all the same. Most were naked or wore only clouts or loincloths—that, and collars.

Here were the great plantations from which Ambreza tobacco came, and tropical fruits as well, men, women, children, all ages out in those fields working, working, working, all worked by these human slaves supervised by Ambreza overlords. Occasionally they would stop and gawk at the hordes passing along the road, but not for very long and certainly not without cowering in abject fear and terror.

Over a thousand years, Marquoz guessed, they’d had the aggressiveness bred out of them and the traits needed to do this sort of job emphasized.

There was a commotion ahead, and Marquoz rushed to find the reason for it. To his surprise, he found three very young human women there, seemingly begging or pleading and looking nervously around. They were naked, wore brass collars, and seemed no different from the rest—except they had the nerve to approach the column where nobody could understand them or would even deign to notice them.

“What’s the meaning of this?” he thundered.

The women reacted as if they’d suddenly gone mad. “You can hear us!” they cried. “You can understand us! Thank God!”

They nodded. He turned to the leaders of the column. “I want the word passed down the line. Any Glathrielites who approach us are to be taken under our protection and kept awaiting my inspection. Clear?”

Word was passed. Shouldn’t overlook any bets or reject any soldiers, no matter how small or flimsy-looking, he decided. Besides, one of ’em might be Gypsy—er, Nathan Brazil. Wouldn’t do to leave him behind after going to all this trouble to pick him up, he thought sardonically.

At the night’s camp he had them brought to him. They had picked up a few more—perhaps twenty in all—along the way, two males and the rest females. They had come through, of course, as had everybody else, and had awakened in Ambreza. The Well didn’t recognize hex-swapping, so Ambreza Entries were deposited in old Ambreza, or Glathriel, while the reverse was true for humans. It made them stand out, of course, and they had been quickly picked up and carted off to Glathriel, where they had been assigned to the fields and had the collars welded on. None could believe the horrible system, and less comprehensible still was the absolute submission of the natives.

His orders had been to reach the northwestern facet of Glathriel and proceed along it to the coast, then turn north into Ginzin and head north until he linked up with Mavra’s army moving due west. His communications were good; Jorgasnovarians, who were huge, ugly, flat creatures with gaping mouths and somehow flew like birds, often raced hundreds of kilometers to an accessible Zone Gate for news, then returned. He knew of the battle in Olborn, and the progress beyond it, almost within hours of their happening—and they now were hearing from him.

Ginzin rose before them along the Sea of Turagin now, and still no Brazil. The nasty, hot, volcanic land was inhospitable to most of their kind, but here, right where the land met the sea, it was passable.

He began to wonder if something had slipped.

The going was slow up the coast, and they had particular troubles with their heavy equipment, which helped take his mind off the anxiety some of the time. Still, he had expected Brazil by now—or, rather, a Brazil look-alike he knew well but which would be Brazil as far as everyone else knew. Where was he?

Finally, on the last evening in Ginzin, they camped as best they could, all strung out up and down the beach, and watched the sun slowly set. He sat there, idly watching the play of sunlight on the rolling waves, although the sun was setting behind him and would be gone before it truly set, when he thought he saw something out there. He stared into the gathering gloom, trying to make it out. A ship—there was a ship out there! Waynir was high-tech, and he could see the billowing smoke from belching stacks as the great craft steamed onward to the northwest. It seemed oddly near to shore, though, taking something of a risk; there were reefs and shoals hidden in the shallows here, a product of lava flows from Ginzin reaching the sea and then being covered with coral and other sea creatures. He reached for his field glasses, gogglelike affairs specially built for his strange eyes. They were effective.

He watched as long as the light permitted him, watched as the mystery ship, without cutting steam, lowered a small boat, which headed in toward the beach.

Suspicious of the whole thing, Marquoz notified the guard to put everyone on alert. Here, in a non-tech hex, backs to the sea on one side and the volcanic cliffs on the other, would be the perfect place to attack.

They watched and waited warily as the small boat approached. Finally, it came in and two dark figures jumped out and pulled it up on what passed for a beach. The only other member of the boat party waited, then got up and jumped down into the shallow water. He shook hands with the other two—who looked, Marquoz saw, like Type 41 humans—and then as the other two pushed off and jumped in, the passenger made his way up to the waiting force, which visibly relaxed now.

He heard the humans in his own party gasp as they recognized the figure, and for the first time he felt a bit better about this whole thing. He walked down to meet the figure.

“Welcome to the war, ah, Brazil,” he called out.

The figure stopped, staring for a moment at the huge, looming creature only half-visible in the darkness, its red eyes blazing. “That you, Marquoz?” he called.

“Yeah, it’s me,” he replied. “Come ahead. We were beginning to give up on you.”

All fires had been extinguished on the sound of the alert, but now they were being restoked. He stepped up to the nearest one, shivered slightly in the slight chill, and nodded in satisfaction.

He was dressed in a pea-green tunic and trousers and wore sandals. His hair was extremely long, down past his shoulders, and he looked slightly weather-beaten and somewhat older than Marquoz remembered—but, then, he’d been here awhile.

Marquoz guessed that the real Brazil probably looked exactly like this one, even to the clothing.

“Any problems?” Brazil asked casually.

“Nothing we couldn’t handle,” Marquoz told him. “You wouldn’t like Glathriel. It’s pretty unpleasant. Plantation slavery. But, still, we got through without a shot fired, much to the disappointment of some of the boys. I’ll give you a rundown later.”

Brazil nodded. “Well, we’ll have a fight now. If I were the opposition, I’d try and get a force in between ours and Mavra’s before we can link up. Might be hairy if we can’t make time.”

Marquoz stared at him suspiciously. For a moment he found himself wondering, wondering if this was, indeed, Gypsy. The mannerisms, the tone and accent, they were all consistent with Brazil. Could it be…?

And then Brazil reached into his tunic and pulled out a cigarette, reached down for an ember and lit it.

Marquoz felt better.

Brazil made a face as he inhaled. “Local stuff,” he muttered grumpily. “Almost all cigar and pipe tobacco. Not really good for cigarettes.”

“We all have to make sacrifices in war,” Marquoz responded with mock sympathy.

At that moment the humans in the party could not be restrained and started running for the small figure by the fire. He looked up at the commotion, his face a mixture of shock and revulsion.

They prostrated themselves before him and cried out, “Nathan Brazil! Master! We are your servants! Speak and we shall obey!”

He looked at them, a whole range of conflicting emotions passing across his face. Finally he went up to the leading humans.

“Look up at me,” he said softly, and they did.

He studied their young faces and forms thoughtfully. Finally he said, almost to himself, “Maybe this god business has some advantages after all…” He looked over at Marquoz. “How many?” he asked.

“Eighteen female, two male,” the Hakazit responded.

Brazil nodded. “Maybe this trip won’t be such a holy terror after all,” he murmured. “Eighteen…”

Gypsy, Marquoz thought, was showing through a bit.