Twilight at the Well of Souls

Zone

“There it is!”

Serge Ortega pounded a piece of paper in his hand and frowned, yet there was some satisfaction in his tone.

The Dahbi raised its head and looked at the sheet. Circled in the intelligence summary was a single item! “Steamer Queen of Chandur hailed Achrin-registered brig Windbreaker. Mixed crew, Achrin visible on deck, but unusual number of smooth-skinned apelike creatures in crew resembling description of Brazil.”

“So?” the Dahbi responded. “Looks pretty routine, despite that crew description.”

“Type 41 humans,” Ortega noted. “They’re agricultural slaves used by the Ambreza. Submissive. Childlike. No government of their own. Just about bought and sold. What the hell are so many of them doing on one ship? And, more important, who taught them to sail it and why?”

The Dahbi considered. “Does sound suspicious. You’ve checked with Achrin and Ambreza, of course?”

“Of course,” Ortega responded irritably. “The Ambreza did have records of a group of thirty sold to a shipping company for use on sailing craft. Said they thought they might be able to handle the sails better and give less trouble than paid crewmembers.”

“Sounds logical,” the Dahbi noted.

“It’s the timing,” he replied. “The timing—and the fact that the holding company’s hell when you try to find out who it is, even what hex it’s in. Achrin’s a water hex, so it doesn’t have any ship registry to speak of. Interesting, too, that these sightings were in Mowrey. Now, suppose—just suppose!—that somehow they’d managed to have a ringer Brazil.”

“A ringer? That does not translate coherently,” the Dahbi told him.

“A double. A duplicate. I don’t know how, but they used that trick when sneaking him in, remember. Set this double up as a sitting duck, then have us chasing him and fighting big battles for him. And meanwhile, the real Brazil, hidden among a bunch of his own kind on a ship, just sails up, say, the Josele-Wahaca Avenue. See what I mean?”

“Hmmm… I don’t know…”

“They’ve played us for suckers and fools all along the line,” he reminded the Dahbi. “They’ve beaten us in battle, they’ve led us a merry chase, and now they’re moving quite differently than we expected and can throw us more curves at any moment. That Awbri force, what’s it for? It’s just sitting there, not linking up with anybody. Uh uh. I think we’d better overhaul that ship and question that crew. Don’t you?”

There was some doubt in the white creature’s tone now, but it was tinged with a sense of helplessness. “I seriously doubt that we can do what you suggest right now,” he responded slowly. “That is a huge ocean, and, as you must know, most of the species of those hexes are deepwater types except along the coastlines. Most likely, too, if what you say is true, they have covered their tracks by altering the ship or, perhaps, by changing ships. I think the best we can do is ask the Laibirian ambassador here to permit no shipping to pass through his hex—that they can do—and force them to land short of their goal.”

Ortega whipped out a map and examined it carefully. “Maybe this is all coming clear now. Since they knew that we’d know they had to make for an Avenue, they also knew that, once they started to move in a given direction, there would be only a small number of Avenues open to them. So you take the big forces and push north, generally heading toward Yaxa-Harbigor, with a Brazil double in full view. This nails down our main forces against their main force. More, there will be the temptation to bring Commander Khutir’s forces from the west now guarding the Ellerbanta-Verion Avenue over to engage the main force in battle, a decisive battle, in which Sangh’s forces and Khutir’s forces will have the entire main enemy army, Brazil apparently included, sandwiched between them. What does this do? Leaves the Ellerbanta-Verion Avenue essentially undefended and Brazil, landing by ship, just walks up eight hundred kilometers and he’s right on the mark.” His tone grew more excited now. “Yes! Of course! And that explains the Awbri force under this Yua sitting tight. If Khutir catches on and stays where he is, her army can do the main fighting, engaging him while Brazil slips through. Or, of course, it can support and protect Brazil if the cat gets out of the bag too early. And, if their plan worked, it could instead be the reserves behind the main force. It’s perfect! A work of sheer genius! It’s almost insidious!”

“You seem to admire it,” the Dahbi noted, puzzled.

He nodded. “I do. A massive piece of misdirection. A magician’s sleight-of-hand with standing armies. You appreciate it the more because you look at this mess and you say to yourself, well, we’re fighting army versus army, when actually it isn’t that way at all. This isn’t a war. This whole thing is to get one man into one particular place at one particular time, nothing more. It’s good.”

“All this presupposes that they somehow do have a duplicate of Brazil, and that the real Brazil is on that ship,” the Dahbi pointed out. “And that remains to be seen.”

“He’s there,” Ortega said emphatically. “If not on that ship, well, on another ship similar to it. We’ll send an alert to all hexes in those areas to be on the lookout. Brazil’s disguises are limited in the open country and in alien surroundings. He might have sneaked through without getting noticed before, but not with everybody looking for him.’”

“And Khutir’s army, then?”

“Should stay where they’re at if they know what’s good for ’em,” Ortega told him. “And notify Gunit Sangh of the new situation.”

“It will be done,” the Dahbi assured him. “But I’m not at all certain how His Holiness will take this.”